This invention relates to providing Internet services for airplane passengers during a commercial flight.
Many people rely on mobile communications to stay connected throughout the day. Some airlines provide Internet access for passengers during flight by using a satellite-based system in which the communication path between the airplane passenger and an earth-based Internet access point traverses a geostationary satellite. Although this provides a workable architecture, time delays of approximately 0.25 seconds are encountered for signals traversing this satellite-based communication path of approximately 44,000 miles. This represents a significantly longer time delay than the few millisecond delays typically observed by Internet users connected by a wire or optical link to a terrestrial Internet access point. Hence users of such an airplane internet service experience unwelcome delays.